The Year in Urban 2014 — Albums That Flopped

Mariah Carey’s latest album, Me. I Am Mariah … the Elusive Chanteuse, entered the Billboard 200 chart at #3, with first-week sales of 58,000 copies, according to Nielsen SoundScan. Mariah’s last non-holiday studio album, Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel, also debuted at #3, back in 2009, but as Billboard notes, the first-week sales on that effort were 168,000 copies. These are the smallest first-week sales figures for a non-holiday album by Mariah since SoundScan was instituted in 1991. The sales were also a bit surprising since Carey hired Jermaine Dupri to serve as her manager, a man who was responsible for Mariah’s biggest hit songs, including “We Belong Together” and “Always Be My Baby.” After stepping down from that job in the wake of the album’s disappointing release, Dupri told Rap-Up TV that “first-week sales sometimes don’t really matter,” adding, “I actually feel like it’s probably one of her best albums she’s ever made.”